Buried Memories
by Caz Malfoy
Summary: CROSSOVER WITH NCIS AND NY. In three different bars the same song plays. Reminding three people about their pasts.


_Disclaimer: I don't own CSI:Miami, NY or NCIS. The lyrics used belong to Meat Loaf, I'm just borrowing them._

Summary: In three different bars, in three different cities, in three different states the same song plays. Reminding three different people about three different pasts.

Author's note: This is a three segment story, starting in Miami, going to DC and then to New York.

Buried Memories

Tim Speedle wasn't one to drink a lot. He would usually only get completely wrecked once every other month, unlike his colleague Eric who seemed to think that Saturday nights were about drinking and nothing else.

When he _did _go out drinking, Tim usually went to one of Miami's vast array of nightclubs with Eric, where him losing the Russian-Cuban man in the crowd was the norm.

A small bar on the back streets of the city was not a place that Tim ever thought he would find himself. But as he had walked past, he had felt some kind of connection to the quaint little place. It had felt as though so invisible force field had been drawing him to the club, Tim had just felt compelled to wander in and have a drink or two; this had been five beers ago.

There had been a sign out front that announced a live act would be performing. He didn't think he would be sticking around to listen to that. Most of the singers he had listened to in places like this in the past had been no better than the people who sung on the subway for loose change.

The act, a slim blond in his mid-twenties, crossed the stage and picked a guitar up. The blond strummed the string once, presumably to gain people's attention, before picking up a tune and beginning the evening's entertainment.

_The skies were pure and the fields were green  
__The sun was brighter than I've ever seen  
__And I grew up with my best friend Kenny  
__We were close as any brothers could be_

Tim paused with his beer halfway to his mouth as he listed the song. He had heard it thousands of times on the radio when the record had first been brought out, but never really caught the opening lines. If he had known the song, he would probably have left the instant he recognised the song. But now, he was entranced by the lyrics.

_It was always summer and the future called  
__We were ready for adventures and we wanted them all  
__And there was so much left to dream  
__So much time to make it real_

As the guy continued to sing a rushing noise began to sound in Tim's ears. Tim was no longer sitting in the club as he blinked and took in his surrounding.

There was snow everywhere, covering the trees and bushes around them. Behind was a large log cabin whose lights twinkled merrily and warmly, completing the Christmassy atmosphere that hung in the air.

Next to him, sitting as Tim was astride a snow mobile, was his best friend Kenny Rodriguez.

They were laughing and joking about something, each of them insisting that he would get to the lake before the other.

They each placed their goggles over their eyes and made sure their helmets were secure before starting the snowmobile engines.

_But I can still recall the sting of all  
__The tears when he was gone  
__They said he crashed and burned, I know I'll never learn  
__Why any boy should die so young._

Everything had happened so fast. Tim had been trailing behind Kenny when Kenny swerved violently, trying to avoid a patch on ice that was blocking his path.

The front of Tim's snowmobile had clipped the back of Kenny's, sending Tim of course as well. The snowmobile had been going so fast that it was impossible to try and get it back under control once it started sliding around on the ice.

The vehicle flipped over, flinging Tim onto his back with a crack that hurt so bad Tim was sure he must have broken something. His head fell backwards, hitting the ice just as hard.

Instantly Tim felt a rush of warmth at the back of his neck and it didn't take a genius to figure out that he was bleeding.

The last thing Tim could remember seeing before blackness consumed him was Kenny being hit on the back with the snowmobile Kenny had been riding.

_We were racing. We were soldiers of fortune  
__We got in trouble but we sure got around  
__There are times I think I see him peeling out of the dark  
__I think he's right behind me now and he's gaining ground_

Tim glanced up at the bartender and ordered another beer, he didn't really feel like moving from his seat and his memories of the past were bringing back demon's he wished he never had. Therefore, he was content to sit and drown his sorrows.

_But it was long ago and it was far away  
__Oh, god, it seems so very far  
__And if life is just a highway  
__Then the soul is just a car_

Tony DiNozzo took a deep breath, picked his glass up and quickly poured the shot down the back of his throat.

He grimaced a little and sighed as the bitter liquid slid down his throat. Setting his glass down on the bar, he instructed the barkeep to fill it with more alcohol.

As the bar tender reached for the bottle to do as Tony instructed someone on the other side of the room wandered across to the fifties-style jukebox that was in the corner of the bar.

Tony thanked the barkeep and reached for his drink, again downing the beverage in a few seconds.

He grinned to the bartender and set his glass down, just as the words of the song reached his ears.

_And when the sun descended and the night arose  
__I heard my father cursing everyone he knows  
__He was dangerous and drunk and defeated  
__And corroded by failure and envy and hate_

Tony glared down at the glass in front of him and quickly ordered another one, as he tried desperately to ignore the memories the song was bringing back to life.

As he drank the liquid he could swear that his cheek was still stinging from all the times his father had struck him across the face.

Tony's mother had died a few months before Tony's tenth birthday. His father had buried himself in his work during the day and his liqueur cabinet during the evening, leaving Tony to be comforted by his tutor.

Every other night, at around ten o'clock, his father would set aside his drink and call for Tony. He would feign interest in his son's school work and studies, before finding something to criticise him about; whether it was Tony's grades, his handwriting or what he was wearing, nothing was too small a detail for Anthony DiNozzo senior.

He would bend Tony over the desk each time and give him lashes with a leather belt on his bare ass cheeks; the quantity would range from five to fifteen a night, depending on how generous he was feeling.

There were endless winters and the dreams would freeze No where to hide and no leaves on the trees And my fathers eyes were blank As he hit me again and again and again 

The lashings and beatings had continued all the way through Tony's adolescence. There were some nights that he would try to hide in various different places, the hall closet or under the bed, but each time Tony didn't arrive in Anthony's office when summoned for, the elder DiNozzo would go on a mission to find his son. And when Tony was found, his punishment for disobeying an order would be fifteen lashes in addition to the hits he would have been receiving anyway.

_I know I still believe, he'd never let me leave  
__I had run away alone  
__So many threats and fears, so many wasted years  
__Before my life became my own_

The night before Tony's graduation he stayed up, packing things into suitcases and holdalls. His father may have been a bastard to him, but he had still bought Tony an SUV when he had asked (Tony had managed to catch Anthony in a generous mood).

Tony had snuck out after his father had gone to bed to load everything he had managed to pack into the trunk of his car.

The next day, as soon as the caps had been thrown up in the air, Tony had pulled his robes off, headed to his car and taken off. Heading for Ohio State and putting New York, his father and his past in the rear view mirror.

_And though the nightmares should be over  
__Some of the terrors are still in tact  
__I'll hear that ugly, course and violent voice  
__And then he grabs me from behind and then he pulls me back_

Tony tossed back yet another shot as the song continued. He had left his father over ten years ago and never looked back. He had gone to Ohio State and made something of himself.

When he was feeling particularly lonely he found that he still had nightmares of his fathers insults and drunken slurs. And there were times when the memories became too much for him.

He grinned a little as the bartender set another drink down in front of him. The memories may become too much sometimes, but that was what alcohol had been invented for, right?

_But it was long ago and it was far away,  
__Oh, god it seems so very far  
__And if life is just a highway  
__Then the soul is just a car_

Lindsay had been wrong about knowing more about Mac than Danny Messer did. She thought she was being clever by bringing him to the club and showing him that Mac played.

What she didn't know was that the club wasn't only Mac's regular haunt but it was Danny's also. Them liking the same club hadn't been intention; Mac had been a regular long before Danny had discovered the club. It was nice to see Mac in a different environment than the lab or a crime scene and Danny found listening to the music Mac and his band played to be almost therapeutic.

_There was a beauty living on the edge of town  
__She always put the top up and the hammer down  
__And she taught me everything I'll ever know  
__About the mystery and the muscle of love_

Danny slowly lifted his beer to his lips and took a long drink, savouring the taste as he allowed the words of the song to wash over him.

Every time he listened to this song the words had the same affect on Danny. Reminding the blue eyed CSI of the first woman he could ever claim to have been in love with.

Juliana Clarkson had lived across the street from the Messer's whilst Danny had been growing up. She had attended the same high school that Danny had and, at seventeen, she was the most wonderful person Danny's fifteen-year-old eyes had ever seen.

Her long blond hair flowed smoothly down her back, swaying around her waist as she walked. Every inch of her was perfect and within a few months of meeting her, Danny was in love. He wanted to be with her more than he wanted to play baseball.

Danny's best friend, Jack, had been the only person he had confided in about his feelings. Jack had laughed and told Danny told get over her. She was two years older than he was and way out of his league.

_The stars would glimmer and the moon would glow  
__I'm in the back seat with my Julie, like her Romeo  
__And all the signs along the highway all said  
_"_Caution! Kid's at play!"_

Jack had been wrong, because after Danny had been admiring from afar for a few months, Juliana had come up to him after baseball practice and asked if he wanted to go for a ride to 'look out point'.

It had been the first time Danny had ever gone up there with someone. No one had ever stood out to him as much as Juliana did.

She had given Danny his first taste of passion. It had been one of the best evenings of Danny's life. Every touch of her hands on his skin hand sent shivers down his spine and every whispered endearment had contributed to the already raging fire that burned inside of Danny.

_Those were the rights of spring and we did everything  
There was salvation every night  
__We got our dreams reborn and our upholstery torn  
__But everything we tried was right_

Juliana had convinced Danny into seeing her again, not that it had been that difficult. The only catch had been that she didn't want anyone to know. Danny had still only been fifteen and should anyone find out, no doubt it would be statutory rape in the eyes of other people.

Juliana and Danny had changed their meeting place to just by the river. It was easy enough to get to and their privacy was pretty much guaranteed.

Everything Danny knew about the female body Juliana had taught him; how to touch just the right spots or which areas would get the best reaction when licked and caressed.

Those memories of Juliana were ones that he would cherish forever. They had been his first taste of true adulthood.

_She used her body just like a bandage  
__She used my body just like a wound  
__I'll probably never know where she disappeared  
__But I can see her rising up out of the back seat now  
__Like an angel rising up from a tomb_

One night Danny had gone to their meeting spot to wait for Juliana as they had agreed. But she had never shown. Danny had waited for three hours for her before heading back to his house.

The next day on his way to school, Danny passed her house and it was empty. There wasn't one piece of furniture that was visible through the bare windows.

When he questioned Louie he had been told than the Clarkson's had got another job in a different city and left the day before, just like that.

Danny never saw Juliana again. He didn't know if she had returned to the city later or even where they had gone. At the time Danny had been devastated, but now, as he sat in the bar drinking his beer, he could honestly say that he was grateful for the lessons she had taught him.

_But it was long ago and it was far away  
__Oh god, it seems so very far  
__And if life is just a highway  
__Then the soul is just a car_

Each young man finished his drink slowly. Each of them listening as the chorus of the song faded and began to mingle with the background noise of their locations.

Simultaneously, they each placed their empty glasses on the surface in front of them. They paid their tabs on the way to the door. As the song finished each tossed a glance over their shoulder, looking back at the club, before disappearing into the night and heading back to their presents lives, momentarily forgetting about their various pasts.

_And objects in the rear view mirror may appear closer than they are  
__And objects in the rear view mirror may appear closer than they are.  
__And objects in the rear view mirror may appear closer than they are.  
__They are…_

The End


End file.
